Jim Inhofe: “I want to make a couple of comments. It is going to be a very significant week. We know pretty much what we are going to…”

“I want to make a couple of comments. It is going to be a very significant week. We know pretty much what we are going to be doing with the defense authorization bill, which I believe, and most people believe, is the most significant bill each year. We have things that need to be done. We came to a great agreement prior to the Fourth of July in terms of the numbers of amendments and the things we had to get accomplished, and I think there is total agreement with that. We had a tragedy that took place during the last 2 weeks while we were in recess. One affected a friend of mine, John Lewis. We had a real interesting--the 100th Congress, we went in, I think, in 1987, and the 100th Congress had a lot of really great people. John Lewis is one of them. John Lewis and I became friends. You couldn't get two guys further apart philosophically than John Lewis and me. Yet we were always close. I watched how peacefully he could get things done. He is someone I got to know quite well. We had a lot of others in that class. Jon Kyl has been very active in recent years. He came back from retirement temporarily. He was in that class. We had Ben Cardin. He and I became close friends. I think he was in the State legislature first. Lamar Smith was one who was very, very helpful to me all those years. Lamar Smith is from South Texas. Freddie Upton--we referred to him as ``Little Freddie Upton''--is probably the most recent one we had who is no longer in that same position.…”